Foliobook for iPad

When the iPad landed earlier this year many photographers were immediately intrigued by the idea of using a tablet computer to present their portfolios to clients and editors. The hardware appeared to be uniquely fit for that purpose but it took a very long time for similarly qualified software to arrive on the market. While there was no shortage of apps able to display pictures as a slideshow, none of them quite made the grade as a professional portfolio presentation tool for reasons I’ll go into later.

The top search engine query bringing people to this blog has for months now been “iPad as portfolio?” or similar. So presumably there is plenty of demand and where there is demand there is money to be made. Even with that lure, for months we waited.

Professional portfolio presentation on a tablet computer ought to be as straight forward as it is in a book. You should be able to put one in the hands of its viewer and have them operate it without instruction. Pressing buttons, navigating through menus and steering a computer program would only serve to distract them from your pictures and deplete their patience. To make this shiny new hardware useful called for software built with simplicity foremost in mind, foregoing the bells and whistles. For months countless apps that I won’t slander by naming seemed to amount to a waste of money and not much more. And then there was Foliobook.

Foliobook works because it presents itself as a virtual portfolio book instead of a computer program that displays pictures. After launching, Foliobook displays a welcome page that is reminiscent of the cover of your hard bound book with branding applied to taste and a list of the portfolios it contains. Choose one and it displays that set of images, returning to the main menu — or the cover of the book — once you’re done. Pretty simple really, yet in a crowded market this is still the only app whose developer realises that when it comes to presenting photography, minimalism is king.

Some photographers have now taken to shipping their Foliobook loaded iPads to Art Directors and Picture Editors through the mail, replacing their printed portfolios but the jury seems to be out on whether this a good idea just yet. While it presents very well and it works out cheaper, plenty of people point out problems like battery power and the undesirable requirement for even minor user intervention that simply isn’t necessary with a printed book. Some ask why you would bother with all that when nothing beats high-quality prints anyway.

Each to their own, but at least with Foliobook around you do have the option.

Related posts:

1. OmniFocus for iPad (for photographers)
2. iPad 1.5